[comp.sys.apple] ALPE, APDA, large storage devices

AWCTTYPA@UIAMVS.BITNET ("David A. Lyons") (01/23/89)

>Date:         Thu, 19 Jan 89 19:37:20 HST
>From:         System Administrator <tsouth@PRO-PAC.CTS.COM>
>Subject:      Bye bye Billion

>[...]
>What say you think about doing a few good things...  Applelink -
>Personal Edition was a helluva start, but still the majority of the
>resources on that forum are for the Mac, not the Apple ][ user.

Excuuuuuuse me?  <baffled look>  The Mac software for accessing ALPE
is not out out Beta test yet!  (I use ALPE all the time as a Forum
Consultant for the Apple II Development forum.)

>What to do?  I really think you should purchase the APDA and have
>some hiring-fest with some of the fanatics that are abundant in the
>support industry. Then, put them in control of this forum.  I'd buy
>almost ANYTHING that Uncle-Dos signed his name to!  I'm sure that a
>large portion of Applers feel exactly the same way.

Apple already _did_ bring APDA back in house.  (I don't think they
"purchased" it, because I think they owned it the whole time.)

As far as _this forum_ (INFO-APPLE / comp.sys.apple) goes, it is
unmoderated--everybody is in collectively in control of the content.
I read A2-Central regularly and respect Tom Weishaar and his opinions
of various products, but A2-Central is not intended to be a Consumer
Reports for the Apple II industry.  I would never buy something
_just_ because Uncle-DOS likes it, but reading an explanation of why
that product is better than its competitors is a different story.  I
_hope_ that a large portion of Applers feel more _that_ way--but if
they're going to follow _somebody_ blindly then Uncle-DOS is not a
bad choice.

>[...] [I still shiver from watch the Woz say that no one is ready for
>the amount of information available on CD-Rom's! Heck my 80 megger
>gets taxed to its limits as it stands!]

(When did he say that, by the way?  I missed it.)  I won't stand in
the way of larger storage devices, and I certainly want one myself,
but sometimes I have my doubts about what the quality of published
CDs is going to be.  Having an 80-meg hard drive that you've
organized yourself over a period of time is one thing, and buying 550
Megs of info for $8 to $10000+ is something else.  Somebody has to
_proofread_ and verify all that info!  Scary, eh?  I was reading
reviews in _CD-ROM Review_ or something like that last year, and the
reviewer had done spot checks on a big database on CD-ROM and found a
disturbingly high fraction of errors.

>Todd South
>UUCP: {nosc, cacilj, sdcsvax, hplabs!hp-sdd, sun.COM}
>                        ...!crash!pnet01!pro-nsfmat!pro-pac!tsouth
>ARPA: crash!pnet01!pro-nsfmat!pro-pac!tsouth@nosc.MIL
>INET: tsouth@pro-pac.CTS.COM - BITNET: pro-pac.UUCP!tsouth@PSUVAX1

--David A. Lyons              bitnet: awcttypa@uiamvs
  DAL Systems                 CompuServe:  72177,3233
  P.O. Box 287                GEnie mail:    D.LYONS2
  North Liberty, IA 52317     AppleLinkPE: Dave Lyons